Media Evaluation

Chance opening

This is our opening sequence called Chance

Survey for Chance

Chelsea created a survey for the audience of our thriller too fill out to give us some feedback on the meaning we have created, whether people enjoyed it, whether they would want to see more and whether our opening sequence actually suited our target audience.

BEFORE you complete the survey; please watch out two minute opening, the link for our opening  is presented below;
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqjgHebiQbA

Below is the link to the survey; 

https://chanceasmedia.typeform.com/to/uKwbAN

Final Sound

We got our final sound of a website that allows you to have the music for free so we don't copyright or buy anything, it is called freeplaymusic.com and allowed us to get a range of different types of music for our opening. We done different sounds and music for the different scenes but was carefull to not put that much different sound in there or this would look silly and childish. So we had music for me and Luke, the opening and the chelseas mum scene. The music is very eary throughout and allows you to get drawn into the opening as the music adds tension. For example when me and Luke see each other the kind of action music that comes with it draws you in as a audience more because you want to know what's going to happen next. All of our final sound got added on Monday.


This is freeplaymusic website.

My progress

I have made a lot of progress from the start of the year, my blogs have improved and i now know what to write on my blogs and i actually blog compared to the start of the year where as i didn't know what to write and also not doing it. I have done a lot of independent blogs about editing and lighting and what we should include for our film based on the different thriller openings like Final destination and Shutter island which has helped me and my group include different things in our film and what not to include. Also as we decided to go with black and white before we made the final decision to do this i done a blogpost and researched if it would be ideal for our film, then we decided to go for it. Without these blogposts we wouldn't be 100 percent about the decision. Also i did not know how to edit the film and wasn't sure about using adobe premiere but Priyanka taught me how to use adobe premiere which allowed me to edit the film while my group done other things. Me and priyanka have come in for 5 free periods a week to edit and film for our movie and Luke and chelsea have also been coming in frequently.

As a group i believe we have come very far because due to the continunity task wasn't as good as we hoped because as a group we weren't talking much to each other and just done our work. But we knew as a group we needed to come along to get the best grade possible and starting talking to each other more and started to come in the free periods. me and Priyanka are editing and re shooting everything that isn't 100 percent and chelsea is also editing. Luke is using his time to make the opening title sequence and chelsea is also helping him with this. We are coming along very good as a group and i believe we will meet the deadlines and get a good grade.

Lighting for our opening

The type of lighting we will go for  would be dim light and we will edit our movie to make it darker than it appears to get more of a thriller look and feel.

I have done research on thriller films and there lights like "Shutter island" and i noticed that throughout the film even though the lighting outside is normal sunlight they have edited it to make it seem darker than it is. This was very effective as it is one of the best thrillers rated and one that i have seen as i was not bored of it.

Changing the opening sequence to Black and White

We decided to change our opening sequence to black and white to help our production as, as a group we decided that it looks better for our sequence and it is very different from other groups as not many people are doing black and white so it is original.

There are a lot off famous black and white thrillers like the stranger, as it is an opening the audience will question about why it is black and white and i believe it will add a lot more tension for the audience if it is black and white as it looks plain and boring in colour.


A modern film using black and white would be Tabu which was done in 2012.

It was done by a famous director Miguel gomes who is mostly famous for the silent movies he has done, this movie is in the old days and therefore they done this in black and white and at the start it starts in full sound and then goes to silent. Black and white allows us to change our story completely as it looks different in colour compared to black and white. 

In the famous film kill bill the colour switches from black and white to colour, they used this to mainly get the film as a rated R due to so much gore they had to change the colour to not have that much blood. this is what they done in the old films to not scare our audience but in modern day with the gore films there is a lot more more gore in colour like Saw.

Colour films started to come in 1930 but it costed a lot of money for the production companies so they only realesed 1 or 2 every year. The black and white film era didn't end quickly and still now we have black and white films as they are cheaper and are very different from normal colour films we have today.

I believe our black and white decision will pay off for the group as it will get originality as our opening sequence and plot is very different from other groups which allows us more room to change and edit our sequence.

Editing progression -Aman Priyanka week beginning 16th March

Blog still in progression 

Shooting schedule

16th march -  Me and Priyanka filming Alley way scene

17th and 18th march- Me and priyanka filming re shoot of Luke's motorbike scene front on shot of Aman's scene, and a low angle back shot of Luke's feet walking away from the camera

17th- kitchen scene with mum 

By the end off this week 22nd of friday all the footage should be done and starting to get edited with the title sequences

New filming in school

Last week we filmed every free period we all had and this allowed us to get a range of different footage to edit which is good as we are not constantly filming every time after edits.

The filming is nearly done but me and priyanka will be filming one shot off me walking straight head on to the camera and also Luke is adding a motorbike scene to allow better opening and draws the audiences tension more.

Footage of mine and Lukes scene uploading soon

Problems with filming in uxbridge

On the 4th of march weekend me luke and priyanka went to uxbridge but realised they wouldn't let us film on the train station we did improvise and film outside the train station but then got told we were causing an obstruction and wasn't allowed to film there again. We then realised we needed a new idea for mine and Lukes scene so made a quick plan of what our new plan was and started to film in school.

The 2nd shot which is the one below was better than the first as you do notice the camera shaking like the first one, but when we looked again in detail me and Priyanka noticed it does the slightest movement, so we did need to reshoot it but then changed the idea completely to make our opening better so did not need to reshoot.

Priyanka tried the pan shot of me coming out off the train station but did not go expected as best as we would of hoped due to not being in the middle of the camera as supposed to be for a perfect clear pan. we did keep trying and got some good ones but none that were perfect.


(Footage uploading soon)

Shot List

This is our shot list (will upload clearer version soon) this will help us with filming the scenes and what angles to use and which ones work best. it will also keep us organised so we can get filming done fast and posible 

Final Typography

These titles need to be made into gif's so they are able to move on and off the screen and also stay on the screen for the same amount of time for all of the titles. Rather than putting all of the titles at the end, we are going to cut them into the clip. This is because we do not want the audience to get drawn into the opening and be excited to watch the rest of the 'film' but they then become bored after staring at titles for around 20/30 seconds - the last thing we want to do as a group is to lose the audience.

The titles will appear in white background with black writing as this will create a bold meaning and the audience will be able to clearly to see this. we have looked at more thrillers and decided to change ours to fit the other thrillers to draw audiences that have seen these different films, we have researched the times and how they come onto the screen and go off the screen. Will upload the times soon

Typography

This is what the title sequences are going to look like (as in white writing on a black background) however Luke has not yet changed the font to out 'harting' choice of font and has not yet placed the text  in the correct place and made them into gif's and edited how they will enter and exit the screen.

We are hoping that these titles will be finished by the end of the week as we need to see how they will fall into place with the footage that we have. It has been a struggle to try and get the title sequence done as Luke is also playing one of the characters in our opening sequence to he is making time for filming. 

(done by chelsea)

progress so far:
 
As chelsea couldn't film the ally way scene as the lighting was too much on the camera as the ally way was wide, so priyanka went on the weekend as her ally way is thinner and not much light and filmed there. 

We have finished my scene of walking outside of the school and watching luke smoke, but today 17th march priyanka is going to reshoot the motorbike scene of Luke as it needs more shots.

Tomorrow 18th of march me and priyanka will add in a front view shot of me walking out to make that part better.

Evaluation Questions

• Marking Criteria for the Evaluation
  
  Candidates will evaluate their work electronically. This MUST contain an element of audience feedback and may be either integrated with the presentation of the research and planning material or may be presented separately. Where candidates have worked in a group, the evaluation may be presented individually or collectively but the teacher must allocate a mark according the contribution/level of understanding demonstrated by the individual candidate.
  The questions that must be addressed in the evaluation are:
  

• In what ways does your media product use, develop or challenge forms and conventions of real media products?
  
  
• How does your media product represent particular social groups?
  
  
• What kind of media institution might distribute your media product and why?
  
  
• Who would be the audience for your media product?
  
  
• How did you attract/address your audience?
  
  
• What have you learnt about technologies from the process of constructing this product?
  
  
• Looking back at your preliminary task, what do you feel you have learnt in the progression from it to the full product?
  Ideas for the format for the presentation of the evaluation can be found in the Guidance Notes. 
  

Filming in uxbridge

On sunday when me priyanka and Luke went to Uxbridge to film, we only had 1 problem with the filming which was the train station as they were being funny to film in there as we need permission. But we used our resources which was to film outside the train station and going to re-film during next week when we get permission from the train station. We have got our footage and will be putting it together with editing it now and Luke will start to put title sequence in. Another problem was when i was walking from the train station people were getting in the way of the camera and as an audience you might get distracted looking at other people, a way which we can sort this problem out would be too go in a less busier timing. The smoking scene with Luke went well as he was sitting in a cafe while no one was there smoking which created a eery and mysterious atmosphere. During our next shoot we will make sure we can get permission from london underground so we can film me coming out of the train looking around so the audience knows where each different character comes from. (Footage will be uploaded soon

Props

 Glasses used for Daisy to serve the drinks in


Car - image uploading soon


Beer bottle - image uploading soon


electric cigarette for train scene - image uploading soon

Locations

Kitchen scene








Kitchen scene













Ally way scene -



Train station scene -




Outside house scene -

Costumes

Costumes / Characters & their basic background - Done by Chelsea

The first character we see is a young woman (around the age of 30-35), she appears on the screen within the first 10 seconds of the opening sequence. We have looked at her character in great detail so that we are able to analyse the evaluation questions and we can look into the idea of stereotypes of women by analysing the representation of gender through our opening sequence. This character is the only female in our sequence. We have pictured her to look like the image below. We also hope to convince Miss Wilson at the school to play this character.

We are also introducing a character which plays the woman above's husband. Hoping to be played by Mr. Smith however we only hear this characters voice. At no point do we see or meet this character.

The second character that actually appears on the screen is being played by Aman in our group, this characters journey begins as we see him exit a train and continue walking. We imagine his costume to look along the lines of the image below.

As Aman's character exit the train, he continues walking and as see him glare at another character as he walks out of the train station, it is dark outside (POV shot), here we meet out 3rd character on screen , this character is a young white male appears to be around 20-30 years of age. When we meet this character, he is smoking outside of the train station and we see him glare over to Aman's character, a close up shot or a POV shot (still undecided)  here we are making the audience aware that there is already some sort of conflict between both of these characters. The character paying for the coffee - we imagine to be costumed like the image below.

We see a drunk man walking down an alley as our next character, he is seen to be obviously dangerous and just by this short scene we notice that this character is going to play a big part in the sequence. He has clearly been drinking a lot and appears to be an alcoholic, we want him wearing a white short with no jacket or coast but we want the shirt to be completely dirty as if h has been wearing it for days, holding a beer bottle, the audience can interpret that this character could be an alcoholic and it makes the scene seem tense. As you can see from the image below; this is what we want our character to look like.

The final character that appears in the scene, appears outside of the house where the poker game will take place. this character turn up in a speeding car that skids as it appears outside of the house - at this point in time we still do not know what costume we want this character to be wearing but we know we want him to be different from the other characters. This will be a job distributed to one of the other members of my group over the half term.

We will be updating the drivers choice of clothing soon

weekend shooting

Scene 4, 5, 6, 7, 8 and 9 me Luke priyanka and Luke will be filming on sunday at ubxbirdge station, i will be in a suit and tie and luke will be in smart trousers shirt and a hat. This could connote me and Luke are important as we are wearing formal clothing. Also towards the end me and Luke look at each other and we will use shot reverse shot to show emphasis and tension throughout as the audience will know we are going to the same place and both off us know it.



























Scene 10, 11 and 12 Chelsea will be filming using her friend as the drunk man walking in the ally way near her house, the man will be wearing ragged clothes and carrying a bear bottle and acting drunk to imply that he is an alcoholic which is another stereotypical view and this will keep the audience guessing as they know all these people will be going to the card game which daisy has poisoned the drinks

First day of filming

Our first scene went quiet well but we did not get all of the first scene done as the timings were abit rushed, the camera shots need to be done again also as we didnt know what angles were best so we done different angles so it would allow us to have a range of footage from us to edit and which ones work best would be used. There is a clip of daisy smiling or giggling so we do need to film most off it again. Also the part when daisy is pouring the poison in the glass is out off focus and the camera angles are not precise and perfect. We started filming on wednesday 26th and will film again on the 28th of friday.

Due to daisy not having the same clothing we have postponed the shooting of this scene till after the weekend when daisy will be free for the longest period of time so we can take our time to shoot the scene with the best acting and best camera angles.

We do need to think about - lighting when we film again
                                           - is the camera in the right angle, can you see everything
                                           - is the camera shaking
                                           - 

storyboard

This is our storyboard done by chelsea. The first 3 pictures are from the actual filming of the scenes, this will give us an overall help with when editing what order to put the scenes in, the last 2 pictures are the title sequence which Luke will be doing, the idea is to have the title sequence as a type writer effect as this is more unusual and will grab the audience.

Staff room - filming scene 1

This is the pictures of the first scene we did, this is where daisy (the host of the card game) starts making and cooking the drink, we then see stereotypical wife cleaning the kitchen and who we assume to be her partner or husband shouting out hurry up their coming, she then puts something in the drinks which the audience could interpret to be poison and puts it on the tray. This is a very good opening scene as it draws the attention from the audience straight away as they do not know why or who she is going to posion.

Title Sequence - Typography

Luke is working on the typography and analysing the different ways of doing the text. We have decided to use Lucky typewriter effect, font size - 60pt. They are all capital letters and as a group we have decided to have a typewriter effect as it will different from everyone else's and will be very original.

Actors so far

Mrs smith - Daisy

Mr smith - Mr fords voice

King of aces - Aman Dhillon

Jack of Clubs - Luke mayes

The joker - Reece Cheeseman

King of spades - need to confirm actor 

(Images to be uploaded soon)

Camera angles

Props and camera angles

In this Post I have captured a few examples of camera angles we can use within different scenes. they all have a different affect:


This is an image of a high angled shot, this could be shown to emphasise one character being inferior. Another use of this camera angle, is to make the character look a lot smaller, again resulting in with the same conclusion that the person under the camera is insignificant.

This is an example of a low angled shot. This shot makes the object/person look larger and more significant. Has the opposite affect of a high angles shot

This is an example of a mid shot, this shot is used to give the audience a sense of real life. This type of shot would make one feel as if they are watching it happen in real life.









This is an example of a long shot. This shot is used to prompt the audience to be aware of the set around them. It also gives off the idea that the scene is moving from one location to another.

The script

Mrs wilson : So who's coming to the game tonight (then puts poison in drink, and makes eye contact with Jones)

Mr Jones: King of aces (while he says it the camera goes over to king of aces Aman- voice over)

aman walks up staires and makes strong eye contact with guy sitting in cafe having costa

cuts from Aman to guy sitting at cafe and Mr jones then introduces him as Jack of spades

camera cuts to ally way where drunk guy chucks bottle at wall and Mr jones introduces him as the joker

guy comes out off car and Mr jones introduces him as ace of diamonds

Sound and possible titles (Done by Priankya)

sound and possible film titles for a western thriller

Common elements of western film (westerns, cowboys and indians) music:* the beat sounds like a horse galloping* harmonica* old-sounding piano* whistling* violins* brass instruments, e.g. trumpets, that give a slight mexican/mariachi feel* simple, clean electric guitar solos, backed by classical guitar rhythms* jews harp* gun sounds* horse sounds* native american ("indian") warcries* bell 

Typical Western Film Titles:

Cowboys Love To Rope And Ride Home Home On The Range Giddy Up Git Along Lil' Doggy I'm Just A Country Boy I Want To Be A Cowboy (Cowgirl) I Want To Grow Up To Be A Cowboy (Cowgirl) Little Buck-A-Roo Our Little Cowboy Real Cowboys Know The Taste Of Dirt Rodeo King In Training Rodeo Queen In Training Stampede Thank God, I'm A Country Boy Wanted Wild Wild West This research was done by Priyanka

Further planning

Over the last few days as a group we split up to do some research on some hybrids, they consisted of sic-fi thrillers, western thrillers, comedy thrillers and horror thriller.

By doing this activity we as a group were going to come back and make a decision as to what was going to be the most unique to execute:

From the research we gathered, collectively as a group we decided to go with the idea of a western thriller.

By choosing a western it allows us to be more broad and get different ideas. we are going along with the card game idea.

Contunity task final cut

for the final cut we were making sure that the actors head was not cut off the screen during filming as this looks very unnatural.

For our final cut we made sure the camera didn't move and held it steady, this is because we know that you cant achieve more than a band 2 if your camera moves. Also we dratiscly reverse shot as we held in near the shoulders rather then away.

We added a establishing shot when me and prianka were walking down the corridor to get realism

Contunity task first cut

Continuity task problems and first edit

This picture below is all off our clips and how we edited it, we believed it would be relatively easy when we first started but then after we started to film it was very difficult. on the first day we had many problems with the camera work and spent half of the lesson figuring out how to function the camera. As we progressed we got better and better.

Problems we have faced so far:

The problems that we faced was setting up the tripod, match on action. We had two shots but match on action works better with two, we filmed in two different classrooms due to the  timings.


What we are going to do to resolve these problems?

For our final edit we will make sure we stay in the same classroom to get it best as we can and also add in another shot for the match on action scene

Problems- 

The camera had cut off one of the actors head, half way through, the person manning the camera realised and moved the camera slightly to fit the persons head in. 

Secondly our shot reverse shot was not shot from the right angles. The camera needed to be further away. 

Finally our use of match on action used three shots to show the characters travels in a quicker way but we sat down straight away which looked unnatural.

Solutions- 

we will take extra precautions with the use of editing. With the camera use we will mke sure the shot is properly framed each time we stop and start the recording.

Feedback

Our teacher has given us some feedback about our video today and we are going to address the problems when we re-shoot and re-edit within the next few days. He told us that out 180 degree angle was fine and we had applied it correctly. The match on action shot that we had applied, we had used the dissolve transition rather than a straight cut, from the feedback we were given, we have been advised just to cut as we have been told to definitely not use the dissolve effect. The third shot of our match on action shot told us that we should show the characters sitting down so that we are continuing to track the movement of the characters. Before the characters enter the scene, we have been advised to have an establishing shot, we have decided to ether have the camera looking at the door for a few seconds or we will stand the camera far away from the door so the establishing shot shows a lot of the background and then we will slowly zoom into the door to show that something important could be happening in the video. With our teachers advice we found problems with the characters sat outside the door, and we couldn't see the mothers face when she was speaking, as our shot reverse shot had failed later on in the video we are going to keep that part how it is apart from filing the last clip as the sons head was cut off at the top. The shot reverse shot is going to be filmed outside the classroom from each point of view of each of the characters.

My evaluation of the first cut

I believe we could of done a much better first cut but due to the lack off experience out of our group we didn't do as well as we hoped, also we didn't talk to each other a lot and this could of been another reason, but we did come up with good ideas and our final cut will be the same idea but just shot in a more effective way

Survey Analysis

 This tells us that cliffhangers do add the interest to the opening of the film so we will need to include this into our opening for the audience to enjoy it the most and actually watch ours, we could have a death scene that is unrelateable and then explain it during the film so the audience is attracted.